Loftily, he said, "This house can't ever have a power outage. It's got solar panels and redundant generators."
"What if you’d just had cataract surgery or something and you couldn't take off your dark glasses?"
"There's also fingerprint recognition. But the way things have been going, I'm worried it'll explode and completely lock us out if I try it."
"A key?" Fen suggested, her eyebrows raised. “Please tell me you have a key.”
He gave a sigh as if the suggestion physically pained him, but said, "Yes, fine, I do have a key."
He took out a key ring in and unlocked the front door with an ordinary metal house key.
"Bravo!" Fen said, grinning. "Sometimes no tech is the best tech."
He managed a faint smile. "Sometimes a leaf is the best compass."
From within the carrier, Precious let out an indignant squeak.
They went inside. Carter commanded, "Jeeves, turn on the lights and raise the temperature to 73°."
Golden light flooded the house. Fen instantly felt warmer. "Jeeves?"
"He's a valet in this book series—"
"—by P. G. Wodehouse," she finished. "Bertie Wooster’s omnicompetent valet. I read those books too. One of the very few works of classic literature my parents owned that’s actually fun to read."
"I could have gone with a woman's name, like Alexa,” he said with a shrug. “But I felt weird ordering a woman to do things for me around the house, even if it's not a real woman."
She patted his shoulder. "And this is why I'm willing to put up with you."
He gave her such a hurt look that she was both startled and dismayed. "I was kidding. I meant, this is why I love you."
But that didn't seem to reassure him. His eyes darkened to deep gray, like a cold mist.
They released Precious, who flew to a window and trilled until they opened it. She flew out and vanished into the trees. Sugar glided up to a ceiling lamp and curled up in its bowl, lounging in the warmth.
Carter showed Fen around in a perfunctory way. The house was beautifully designed, which didn't surprise her. He didn't show her the automated functions, but only explained that everything could be voice commanded. Voice commands were nothing new, so she was sure this home had many more tricks up its sleeve. But he was so depressed about the wings that she supposed there was no room in his mind for anything else.
She stopped him in the middle of showing her the guest bathroom. "Carter. I don't really care about the house. I mean, I'm sure it's great, but you obviously don't care about it either, so let's cut to the chase. I know you're really upset about the wings. I get it. Anyone would be. But we're going to fix this. Why don't we sit down and talk about our next moves instead of pretending either of us is dying to see the color scheme in the main bedroom?"
Carter gazed at her with eyes the dull gray of despair. "Okay. Fine. No point delaying the inevitable. I appreciate you driving me here. You can go now."
"Go?" Fen echoed blankly. "Go where?"
"Home. Little Bit. Anywhere, so long as it's away from me."
She felt punched in the gut. Was he dumping her? Had she been an idiot to think he loved her?
Fen forced herself to stop jumping to the worst possible conclusions. Sheknewhe loved her. She could feel it. So why…?
Then she realized. “Are you planning to summon Balin?”
He looked so startled and furtive that she knew she’d been right. So that was it. Love and annoyance swelled in her as she realized that he was making a misguided but well-meaning attempt to protect her.
Firmly, she said, “Forget about it. I'm not leaving you here to deal with Balin all by yourself. I get that you want to protect me. I get that I'm not a shifter and I don't have any special powers, but I can throw a mean can of soda, and things don't explode when I touch them, and I don't have an inner animal that can be commandeered and used against you. So in fact, I’m in less danger than you are. I'm staying."
She folded her arms. When he had nothing to say of up in response, she added, "So that's settled."
But his eyes stayed gray, a dull lusterless shade like depression itself. "This isn't about Balin. It's about me. I'm a monster. You’re a brilliant, sexy, beautiful, kind, funny, brave, absolutely wonderful woman. You deserve someone like you. I've been stringing you along because I wanted to be with you so much, but I can't do it anymore. You need to go."
